The notion of convergence is foremost on the minds of the broadcast industry, and the same holds true for systems and software developer Discreet.

The Montreal-headquartered company’s corporate theme for NAB2001 is ‘onscreen, onair, online,’ furthered by the capacity to ‘create once and use anywhere.’ It may sound like a typical convergence spiel, but Discreet’s offerings this year back up the idea of compatibility and streamlined workflow.

‘The biggest thing to emphasize for all [of our] products is the infrastructure that connects everything,’ explains Dion Scoppettuolo, Discreet’s product marketing manager for editing products. ‘With our customers there is more talk about how to make their work more efficient.’

And this is precisely the aim of Discreet’s new infrastructure solution that it’s launching at NAB.

The new solution encompasses updated versions of a host of Discreet products: Frost 2.5, Backdraft 4.6, Smoke/Fire 4.5, Edit 6, 3ds max 4, Inferno 4.5 and Flame/Flint 7.5. The new version of the Frost 3D graphics software will feature advanced integration with 3ds max, which in turn will have further compatibility with the Combustion visual effects system. Discreet updates across the board will offer new or advanced integration with existing products.

Discreet Backdraft and Jobnet free up other systems (Inferno, Fire, Flame and Frost) from housekeeping activities, including archiving, media I/O and asset relocation, which can immobilize machines for up to 30% of their time.

‘Backdraft is a background workstation that keeps all metadata from the editing systems and divides the information through Backdraft,’ Scoppettuolo explains. ‘Jobnet is suited for an editor, a graphic artist or even a producer who isn’t doing direct work but wants to see the work and make comments without tying up the editing systems.’

Edit 6 offers Web-streaming capabilities with support for QuickTime, Windows Media Player and RealNetworks codecs for both production and distribution. The software also offers multicam support for up to nine cameras. ‘It can cut between live [cameras for awards or studio shows] at an uncompressed quality,’ says Scoppettuolo. ‘You don’t have to recapture it, and it saves a lot of time.’

Discreet’s move toward mastering in HD is a further attempt to save time, albeit in the long run. Although few consumers presently own an HDTV, Maurice Patel, Discreet product marketing manager for effects products, stresses the importance of working in ‘the highest common denominator.

‘[Working in HD] offers the best-looking imagery with a greater control over the images, and you can also re-purpose without a loss of quality.’

‘[HD] lets you future-proof your project,’ adds Scoppettuolo. ‘With an HD master, you don’t have to redo it.’

Patel says Discreet’s bottom line is providing its customers with software that is cost-efficient, time-efficient and quality-efficient.

‘Discreet’s solution is to open flexibility to our customers, in price, for example, to tie in the high-end product with the cost-efficient because [our customers] don’t always have the budget,’ he says. ‘To ignore that would be blindness on our part.

‘[We] want to unite all of our systems, also with external applications, to use in a collaborative environment. There is a definite need to collaborate efficiently.’ *

-www.discreet.com